One of the most important career tools any actor or actress should develop as soon as possible is a professional resume. This resume will follow you along your career path and be a record of all your experiences and skills. However, knowing what should be included on your resume can be challenging, especially when the acting resume can differ so drastically from a normal, traditional resume. Here are some tips to help you create the best resume you can to accurately represent your musical theatre acting experience and skills.

Categorizing Experience

You should always include your past acting experience on your resume. However, since there are so many different types of roles that you may aspire to, especially when you are first starting out, you may wish to categorize your experience into an easy-to-read format. You can separate your experience into different categories such as theatrical productions, film roles or television productions. One important tip to remember is to make sure you list your experiences with the most recent first work backwards from there. If you are just starting out, you should still list your experience even if your past roles were small. Include accurate information about the productions you were a part of. Also include information about any specific lead singing roles you’ve played so that employers can easily see your musical experience.

Selecting Your Headshots

There are a variety of options when it comes to selecting the headshot you want to use with your resume. You’ll find that directors look for different styles of headshots depending on what they’re casting for. It is best to get your headshot professionally done and make sure that you can trim it down to the same size as your resume. One of the most important things to remember is that if you are selected for an audition, make sure you show up to it in the same style and manner with which you presented yourself in your headshot.

Update Frequently

Once you create the best possible resume, remember that you should always keep your resume updated and current. Some examples of places to update your resume include physical appearance changes, new production experiences and development of special skills such as voice acting, combat training, singing, dancing, special accents or languages spoken and the ability to ride a horse. There are many roles that may require one or more of these skills. Accurately representing them may help you stand out from the other applicants.

Getting your headshot and resume done are essential steps to achieving success in this profession. You should never procrastinate if you need to update or change some aspect of these. Your resume represents you, and it’s the start of building your musical theatre acting career.

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